Report on local sustainability of the Basque Autonomous Community 2008

Technical Secretariat

BASQUE GOVERNMENT

REPORT ON LOCAL SUSTAINABILITY OF THE BASQUE AUTONOMOUS COMMUNITY 2008

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

BASQUE GOVERNMENT

c ihobe 2009

PUBLISHED BY: Public Society of Environmental Management, IHOBE, S.A.

CONTENT PREPARATION: This document has been prepared by Ihobe together

with the consultant team Minuartia Enea

PHOTOS: Mikel Arrazola © Archives “Argazki” Eusko Jaurlaritza - Basque Government

DESIGN: Artentraç

TRANSLATION: Elhuyar

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Technical Secretariat

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

REPORT ON LOCAL SUSTAINABILITY OF THE BASQUE AUTONOMOUS COMMUNITY (2008)

1. GENERAL FRAMEWORK AND CONTEXT Deployment of local agenDa 21 in the Bac a moDel of common management of local agenDa 21 oBservatory of local sustainaBility of the Bac

2. IMPLEMENTATION OF LOCAL AGENDA 21 characteristics of local action plans general implementation of the local action plans

3. ACTION AND RESULTS BY THEMATIC FIELDS contriBution to the aalBorg commitments implementation of the local action plan By thematic fielDs state anD trenDs in local sustainaBility anD efficiency of policies

4. CITIZEN PARTICIPATION AND TRANSVERSALITY OF PROCESSES internal coorDination anD transversality of processes of the local agenDa 21 citizen participation

5. OUTCOME AND CHALLENGES

6. UDALSAREA 21: DEPLOYMENT OF INSTRUMENTS FOR ACTION

2

5

7

14

16

19

1 GENERAL FRAMEWORK AND CONTEXT

The Report on Local Sustainability (RLS) of the Basque

Autonomous Community (BAC) is an initiative of

Udalsarea 21, the Basque Network of Municipalities for

Sustainability. Its aim is to assess the implementation of

the Local Action Plans of the Local Agenda 21 (LA21) and

the evolution of local sustainability indicators yearly.

The RLS is a document prepared within the framework

of the Local Sustainability Observatory of the BAC of

Udalsarea 21, a network consisting of 197 Basque muni-

cipalities and the whole Basque supramunicipal public

administrations: Basque Government, Provincial Councils

and the Basque Municipalities Association EUDEL.

This document summarizes the most remarkable aspects

contained in the Reports on Local Sustainability of the

BAC of 2007 and 2008, which shall continue in the middle

of this year with the edition for 2009.

DEPLOYMENT OF LOCAL AGENDA 21 IN THE BAC

The 2nd Environmental Framework Programme of the BAC

(2007-2010) sets and acknowledges the Local Agenda 21

as the key articulation instrument for the environmental

improvement and deployment of the programme from a

local basis.

At the beginning of 2009, the number of municipali-

ties having Local Action Plans of LA21 is 218, therefore

an 86.9% of the total Basque municipalities. In terms of

population, it means that the 98.8% of BAC inhabitants

live in a municipality with LA21.

3 |

A MODEL OF COMMON MANAGEMENT OF LOCAL AGENDA 21 The Local Action Plans (LAP) must be effective mana-

gement instruments for municipalities. With this aim,

a common deployment model is set from Udalsarea 21.

This model includes the following tasks constituting a

yearly cycle of management of Local Action Plans:

· PLANNING of proceedings

· PERFORMANCE of proceedings

· ASSESSMENT of the IMPLEMENTATION of the Local

Action Plan

· Calculation of SUSTAINABILITY INDICATORS

At the beginning of 2009, there are 90 municipalities and

regions that have added this yearly cycle of management

to their running. With this common model we contribute

to an effective transverse integration of the Local Ac-

tion Plan within the town councils.

This yearly cycle is complemented with the task of

REVISION of the Local Action Plan once the validity

period ends and according to a common methodology.

It is predicted that in the middle of 2009 the number

of municipalities having a second LAP adapted to

their needs and current challenges will be a dozen.

Figure 1. Distribution of municipalities with Local Agenda 21 and belonging to Udalsarea 21

GENERAL FRAMEWORK AND CONTEXT

In order to make the implementation of this model easier,

Udalsarea 21 has defined a common methodology and

developed the computer application MUGI 21 for the in-

tegrated management of the LA21, installed in more th

an 150 municipalities within the network. This makes

possible a more effective management of the process,

as well as the further integration of data, extracting ave-

rages and comparisons between municipalities and the

analysis of time evolution.

OBSERVATORY OF LOCAL SUSTAINABI-LITY OF THE BACIn its second Strategic Plan (2006/2009), Udalsarea 21

emphasizes its “Quality Commitment”, to be articulated

by means of the “assessment and improvement in pro-

cesses and proceedings requirable to all its members”.

In tune with this commitment, a group of proceedings is

set. Among them, in the first place, the implementation

of yearly programs to help calculate sustainability indica-

tors and to assess Local Action Plans in municipalities.

In second place, the creation of the Observatory of Local

Sustainability of the BAC, global platform of integration,

tracking and interpretation of the results from the indica-

tors calculation and the assessment of Local Action Plans.

Data from the assessment of LAPs and indicators from

each municipality are incorporated to the computer envi-

ronment MUGI 21 of the Technical Secretariat of the net-

work, so enabling the global analysis and interpretation

of data. Based on this information and the assessment

of the improvement commitments set the previous year,

the Report on Local Sustainability of the BAC is prepared.

SCOPE OF THE ASSESSMENT PROCESSES OF LOCAL ACTION PLANS AND CALCULATION OF INDICATORS FROM UDALSAREA 21 MUNICIPALITIES (2009):

90 participating municipalities and regions9.830 assessed actions contained in

90 local action plans 2.500 calculated indicators

1.100 participating municipal technicians

Municipalities with LA21 belonging to Udalsarea 21Municipalities with LA21Municipalities without LA21

4 |

Figure 2. Observatory of Local Sustainability of the Basque Autonomous Community (BAC)

TECHNICAL SECRETARIAT UDALSAREA 21: IHobE

OBSERVATORY OFLOCAL SUSTAINABILITY

OF THE BAC

MUNICIPALITIES

REPORT ON LOCAL SUSTAINABILITY OF THE BAC

GENERAL FRAMEWORK AND CONTEXT

5 | IMPLEMENTATION OF LOCAL AGENDA 21

IMPLEMENTA-TION OF LOCAL AGENDA 21

CHARACTERISTICS OF LOCAL ACTION PLANSAssessed LAPs have an average of 112 actions and their

performance means an average of 13 agents, mainly, mu-

nicipal technical services.

Regarding the thematic distribution of actions, the

first remarkable aspect is the wide diversity of fields

taken into account, integrating in a more and more ba-

lanced way socio-economic aspects and social participa-

tion (30%), territorial aspects (26%) and environmental

aspects (44%).

In some cases, municipalities have gone for Local Action

Plans with a nature almost exclusively environmental,

whereas in others they have incorporated a strong social

economic component. This latter profile seems to be

appropriate for small municipalities, where the LA21 can

mean an instrument and a reference for the strategic

planning of the whole local public policies.

More recently, actions specifically considered as of cli-

mate change have been started to be incorporated, like

the preparation of mitigation strategies or the counting

of greenhouse gas emissions. Although they still have

a comparatively reduced importance, their progressive

integration in the most recent LAPs means that it shall

constitute an emerging field with a higher importance

from the revision of the Local Action Plans.

2

6 |

Total: 7,940 actions

Graph 2. State of performance of actions of the Local Action Plans in Udalsarea 21 (2008)

completedactions 8%

actions about to be completed

10%

advanced actions 21%

started actions29%

GENERAL IMPLEMENTATION OF THE LOCAL ACTION PLANSThe Report on Local Sustainability of the BAC 2008

extracts a series of conclusions from the assessment of

the degree of implementation of LAPs done in 71 muni-

cipalities in 2008. Among these conclusions, we must

emphasize:

a reasonably • positive, although insufficient, degree of implementation of LAPs, is shown. 30.4% of its performance is achieved in an average period of two years and a half, in the middle of its validity. an adequate aim of performance for this period would reach 34%.

the performance of lap is done at a • quite stable rhythm in the course of the years of implementa-tion, although slightly lower than a reasonable goal. this difference increases from the fourth and fifth year, coinciding with the average period of validity of laps.

the • Local Action Plans that started in the last three years have a rhythm of growth doubling the one of the previous years. the increase and improvement of the support services provided to the town councils, the higher number of help lines for the implementation of the Basque government and provincial councils, and the allocation of human resources have undoub-tedly contributed to this positive trend.

32% of actions are pending to start.• consequently, it would be appropriate for town councils to specifically analyse this group of action in order to identify the barriers for the implementation (lack of economic or technical resources, lack of responsible people, defi-nition of the inadequate action, formulation of the obsolete action, etc.) and the measures for overco-ming them.

Graph 1. Evolution of the average degree of implementa-tion of the Local Action Plans in the municipalities of Udalsarea 21 (2008)

Year of implementation

40%

20%

0%1 2 3 4 5 6

57.0%

70.5%

50.5%

60.0%

43.8%

49.5%

35.7%

39.0%

25.3%

28.5%

16.2%

18.0%

60%

80%

Level of implementation of the objective

Udalsarea 21 average level of implementation

pending actions 32%

IMPLEMENTATION OF LOCAL AGENDA 21

7 |

3 ACTION AND RESULTS BY THEMATIC FIELDS

CONTRIBUTION TO THE AALBORG COMMITMENTSThe Aalborg Commitments are the international referen-

ce framework to deploy the processes of Local Agenda 21

in the Basque Country. Udalsarea 21 signed these Com-

mitments in 2004, together with other 110 local institu-

tions, in the 4th Conference of Cities and Towns towards

Sustainability, Aalborg+10.

From the assessment of the performance of the Local

Action Plans, an assessment of the contribution to the

performance of the 10 Commitments of Aalborg by the

municipalities’ members of the network has been done.

The main conclusions of this analysis are:

actions associated to commitments 3. • Common nature’s goods, 9. Equality and social justice, 4. Responsible consumption and ways of life and 6. Better mobility and reduction of traffic are those which show a higher number of actions done, both due to the high number of actions planned and the further degree of implementation.

commitments 7. • Local action for health, 8. Lively and sustainable local economy and 1. Forms of Government are those which offer a lower perfor-mance because there are few actions planned and the majority has not been completed yet.

ACTION AND RESULTS BY THEMATIC FIELDS

8 |

IMPLEMENTATION OF THE LOCAL ACTION PLAN BY THEMATIC FIELDS Within the framework of Udalsarea 21, the whole actions

contained in the Local Action Plans are classified in 24

specific thematic fields of territorial, environmental and

social and economical nature. The segmented analysis of

the degree of implementation of actions according to the-

se thematic categories enables to value the level of effort

done from de local policies in each of them. With this, the

assessment done regarding the Aalborg Commitments is

complemented and some specific aspects of the munici-

pal management are studied in depth.

The main conclusions obtained from the analysis of the

degree of implementation by thematic fields are:

Mobility and transport• , together with Welfare and social justice, are the fields collecting more actions done, both due to the number of actions planned and the advanced degree of performance. together with them, the execution of actions in the fields of territory and planning, awareness and sustainable consumption, Waste and Water is also remarkable.

actions with a lower degree of implementation are •those related to the environmental control, mainly Atmosphere, Acoustics, and Soils, and those linked to aspects requiring a certain level of administrative management, like Environmental Management of economic activities and environmental Risk. toge-ther with them, other fields of social nature with poor implementation are also identified, especially housing.

166

157

128

111

89

81

53

44

43

40

0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180

Number of actions performed

3. Common nature’s goods

9.Equality and social justice

4. Responsible consumption and ways of life

6. Better mobility and reduction of traffic

5. Urban planning and design

2.Municipal management for sustainability

10. From local to global

1. Forms of government

8. Lively and sustainable local economy

7. Local action for health

The

Aalb

org

com

mitm

ents

Graph 3. Level of performance of actions of LAPs according to the Aalborg Commitments (2008)


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ned. This enables to globally assess the efficiency of the

implemented policies, both from the local scale and

from the supramunicipal policies directed to support the

action of municipalities. And with all this, the last aim of

this Report is to provide guidelines and general criteria

for the design and adjustment of policies in the future.

A summary of the results of the main common indicators

calculated and the main conclusions obtained by large

thematic fields appears below.

STATE AND TRENDS IN LOCAL SUSTAINABILITY AND EFFICIENCY OF POLICIES The yearly calculation of the common indicators of Local

Sustainability of Udalsarea 21 by the town councils provi-

des valuable information to prepare an X/ray of the state

and trends of the municipalities in terms of sustainability.

The combination of the information provided by the

assessments of the performance of LAPs and the one

provided by the indicators make possible to contrast

the effort done with the degree of importance obtai-

Graph 4. Level of performance of actions of LAPs by subject (2008)

Number of actions performed

Mobility and transport

Welfare and social integration

Land and planning

Awareness and sustainable consumption

Waste

Water

Environmental management of the local administrationEconomic development

Biodiversity and natural environment

Energy

Culture

Euskara

Communication and citizen’s participationEnvironmental management of

economic activitiesLabour market

Health

Equality

Acoustics

Housing

Atmosphere

Lands

Environmental risk

264

242

184

174

170

152

139

133

119

94

78

76

70

56

49

41

32

31

30

28

17

10

0 30025020015010050

Them

atic

fiel

ds


10 |

TERRITORIAL ASPECTS (2006)

Indicator Average value

Maximum value

Minimum value

AVAILABILITY OF OPEN PUBLIC AREAS AND SERVICES IN THE MUNICIPALITY

town with open public areas, 5 minutes or less away from the residence (%) 68.7 100.0 16.1town with health services 5 minutes or less away from your home (%) 57.5 97.0 8.1town with food establishments 5 minutes or less away from your home (%) 69.1 98.0 2.0town with public transport stations 5 minutes or less away from your home (%) 63.7 100.0 0.0town with containers or recycling facilities 5 minutes or less away from your home (%) 82.6 100.0 32.7

town with education centres 5 minutes or less away from your home (%) 52.2 95.0 0.0

SUSTAINABLE USE OF LAND

artificialized municipal area (%) 14.9 69.8 1.2new developments in abandoned land (%) 6.3 39.7 0.0protected area (%) 25.6 63.5 0.0

LOCAL MOBILITY AND PASSENGER TRANSPORT

regular trips walking (%) 39.5 66.0 22.3regular trips by car (%) 39.4 70.5 30.4regular trips by public transport (%) 21.2 73.0 0.0Bidegorri network (km/1.000 inhab) 2.1 8.9 0.0

note: the values collected in this table consider in some cases the last value available on each municipality. the values not always coincide with 2006 year, because there is data coming form surveys not accomplished with annual frequency.

the average value of artificialized area is moderate. •nevertheless, in a territorial context with a severely rough orography like the Bac, the soil suitable for urban development is a limited natural resource requi-ring a sensible and sustainable management. the new developments on deserted land of some municipali-ties are a good example in this sense.

the existence of different • financing programs of the supramunicipal administrations directed to support local mobility actions undoubtedly contributes posi-tively to the high level of action in this field, and it is consistent with the guidelines of the efp ii.

In spite of the efforts done• regarding mobility within the framework of the la21, the results of the local and global indicators of the BAC still show unsatisfactory values and/or trends. this rises the need of giving

coherence to the economic, town-planning and in-frastructure policies affecting the mobility model at different levels and of increasing the efforts done at a local level and of improving the efficiency of specific policies.

actions related to Biodiversity and natural environ-•ment show a poor degree of implementation. never-theless, the degree of implementation has increased, something that has undoubtedly been promoted by the consolidation of specific financing lines for biodi-versity actions of the local action plans.


11 |

ENVIRONMENTAL ASPECTS (2006)


Maximum value

Minimum value

WATER CYCLE

household water consumption (l/inhab/day) 120.8 140.6 102.1houses in the municipality connected to the drainage network (%) 72.9 99.1 0.0losses in water distribution (%) 31.1 42.4 21.5ENERGY CONSUMPTION

household consumption of electricity and natural gas (toe/inhab/year) 0.20 0.28 0.11energy consumption in lighting (kW/inhab/year) 143.2 244.1 35.5GENERATION AND MANAGEMENT OF WASTE

urban waste generation by inhabitant and day (kg/inhab/day) 1.33 2.54 0.74Waste selectively collected (%) 25.9 41.7 11.4ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS IN THE MUNICIPALITYDegree of implementation of ems (iso 14001, emas, ekoscan, sustainability reports) in companies (total no.) 4.2 16 0

Degree of implementation of ems (iso 14001, emas, ekoscan, sustainability reports) in public institutions (total no.) 0.7 3 0

AWARENESS AND SUSTAINABLE CONSUMPTION

environmental education activities 4 22 0

CLIMATE CHANGEinventory of greenhouse gases (tco2e/inhab/year) 5.9 7.5 4.6

the • household water consumption obtained from the values provided by the municipalities is apparently low. on the contrary, the percentages of losses in the distribution are remarkable, and still far from the goal of the efp ii for 2010 (25%). likewise, there are still sig-nificant deficiencies in counting the consumption of some municipalities, a fact which limits an accurate analysis for the whole network to a certain extent.

Despite the fact that the field of • waste has an impor-tant level of action, the indicators of management of urban waste do not reflect, in general, neither any reduction in production indicators nor any increase in selective collection enough to make possible to reach the aim set in efp ii for 2010 (35% recycling ur-ban waste).

having into account the period of time from the im-•plementation of the selective collection and values reached, it seems appropriate to check the limiting factors in order to these values to increase in the diffe-rent municipalities. and from this on, to consequently adapt the models of management, allocation of co-llection infrastructures, and/or activities of commu-nication identified for a priority improvement.

the number of • actions planned in the laps regarding the improvement of the environmental behaviour of the administration and the Awareness and con-sumption of the population is high and quite similar, something positive for the intensity of the effort,

and reasonable in its balance. it symbolically reflects an equitable distribution among the responsibilities assigned to the town council and those given to the citizenship. nevertheless, the degree of implementa-tion of actions of environmental management of the municipal administration (25%) is lower than that of the awareness and consumption (29%).

the main contribution to the fight against climate •change is done through the mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions coming from the actions of mobility, energy, consumption and awareness and Waste, me-aning 30% of the actions of the whole laps, and being equivalent to 2.300 actions in total. it can be inferred from this that the Local Action Plans of LA21 potentia-lly represent instruments of great importance for the transfer of aims and mitigation measures considered within the framework of the Basque plan of fight against climate change (2008-2012).

the development of a • common methodology to cal-culate Greenhouse gas emissions and its application to 17 municipalities, already, means a success factor of the network. this calculation enables to know the evolution of each municipality over the years and offers the possibility to compare scenarios. the average value obtained is close to the average of the Bac, spain and the 27-european union, although the methodology differences and the availability of infor-mation limit its possibility of direct comparison.


12 |

(tCO

2 eq/

inha

bit)

123456

0

78

Average municipalities

from Udalsarea 21

5.8

Average municipalities

from MPSF

5.7

BAC

6.7

Spain

6.3

27-EU

7.3

Graph 5. Comparison of Greenhouse gas emission by inhabitant (2006)

note: the represented emissions do not include those associated to the primary sector, the industry sector and the activities of energy transformation. methodologies applied and sources of information used do not coincide in all cases, therefore they partially limit the level of direct comparison between values.

mpsf: municipalities and provices spanish federation - Bac: Basque autonomous community

SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC ASPECTS (2006)


Maximum value

Minimum value

POVERTY AND SOCIAL EXCLUSION

families receiving the benefit of the Basic income (%) 2.3 4.0 0.3

LABOUR MARKET

unemployed labour force (%) 7.2 22.00 1.7self control rate (%) 24.8 53.8 12.4

DEMOGRAPHY

year-to-year population difference (%) 1.9 3.7 0.5population ageing rate (% population older than 64 years with respect to the total) 19.5 25.9 14.1

CITIZEN PARTICIPATION

meetings with the participation of citizens (no. meetings) 4.6 24.0 0.0people attending citizen participation meetings (no. total different attending people in all the sessions) 62.7 222,0 0.0

BASQUE LANGUAGE

Basque-speaking population (%) 59.8 97.5 0.7HOUSING

Building of council houses (no. of council houses finished in the last 5 years) 5.7 51.3 0empty houses (%) 17.4 34.1 3.6ECONOMIC VITALITY

creation of companies (balance between registrations and resignations of establishments in the municipality/1.000 inhabitants) 1.1 10.0 -22.6


13 |

ASPECTOS SOCIALES Y ECONóMICOS (2006)


Maximum value

Minimum value

SATISFACTION OF CITIZENS REGARDING THE COMMUNITY

satisfaction regarding the municipality in general (from 1: very low to 5: very high) 3.3 4.4 1.4(…) the quality of housing, its availability and affordability (from 1 to 5) 2.4 3.8 1.5(…) the existing job opportunities (from 1 to 5) 2.3 3.8 1.1(...) the quality and amount of the natural environment (from 1 to 5) 3.3 4.6 2.4(...) the quality and amount of the built environment (from 1 to 5) 3.0 4.0 2.1(...) the level of social and health services (from 1 to 5) 3.1 4.2 2.1(...) the level of cultural, recreational and leisure services (from 1 to 5) 2.8 3.7 1.8(...) the quality of education centres (from 1 to 5) 2.9 4.0 1.5(...) the level of public transport services (from 1 to 5) 2.7 4.0 1.6(...) the opportunities to participate in the municipal planning and decision (from 1 to 5) 2.4 3.6 1.5

(...) the level of public safety (from 1 to 5) 3.3 4.6 1.7

Actions• directed to social improvement and local economic progress increase and consolidate their importance within the assessed local action plans, reaching around a 30% of the total. those municipalities with a smaller size and those which have checked their laps are those which have given more importance to these fields.

indicators on population satisfaction show a • profile of needs differentiated between large and urban municipalities on one hand, and small and rural ones on the other. While the latter ones value in a more positive way the housing, the natural environment,

the public safety or the citizen participation, the large ones have a better assessment of the public transport, the built environment, the social and health services and the cultural offer.

the • access to housing is one of the worst valued aspects among the population, contrasting with its low importance in the Local Action Plans of LA21. although this fact is conditioned by the higher importance of the supramunicipal administrations in the housing policy, it is still an important aspect to take into account for the future checks of laps.


4 CITIZEN PARTICIPATION AND TRANS-VERSALITY OF PROCESSES

INTERNAL COORDINATION AND TRANS-VERSALITY OF PROCESSES OF THE LO-CAL AGENDA 21.

The involvement of the whole technical staff and poli-

tical representatives is fundamental for an effective im-

plementation of the LA21 since it affects a wide range of

thematic fields and instruments of management of town

councils. The transversality of the process constitutes,

therefore, a value itself which seems appropriate to be

specifically assessed.

The results obtained show that in the 70% of actions from

LAPs, municipal areas different from the one of the coor-

dinator person take part, a fact reflecting an apparently

remarkable degree of transversality.

On the other hand, it must be emphasized that a third

part of the consulted municipalities state that they have

stable specific coordination bodies associated to Local

Agenda 21, while there are also many others that have a

general technical coordination body incorporating some

times the aspects linked to the LA 21.

Although these bodies have a mainly informative function,

there is an increasing number of municipalities beginning

to incorporate functions of validation of the results obtai-

ned in the assessment of the LAPs and the calculation of

indicators, and, in more specific cases, to contrast and plan

actions contained in LAPs.

15 | CITIZEN PARTICIPATION AND TRANSVERSALITY OF PROCESSES

ses have a poor dynamism, especially in the stage of im-

plementation of LAPs.

Only a fourth part of municipalities have participation bo-

dies meeting in a stable way and with a regular recurren-

ce, higher than two times a year, a situation which gets

worse as the period passed from the approval of the Local

Action Plan increases.

Likewise, it is affirmed that in 62,5% of cases, the participa-

tion sessions organized have a merely informative nature,

or are used to collect specific complaints and requests.

CITIZEN PARTICIPATIONA second fundamental element to fully deploy the proces-

ses of LA21 is to incorporate citizen participation intended

to improve the quality of design of LAPs, as well as facilita-

ting and boosting its further implementation.

From the analysis done, it can be deduced that more than

half of the municipalities have a formal level of participa-

tion Forums considered stable, which are complemented

with other instruments of participation with a thematic or

sectorial nature in 2,5% of cases.

In spite of the strong disparity among municipalities, the

analysis performed shows that the participative proces-

Participation sessions have the following aim, basically:

Average number of participants in each session of the participation forum

<5 5 - 10 10 - 20 >20

Frequency of meetings of the mechanism of citizen participation

23%23%

4%

50%

26%

10%

46%

18%

25%31%

32%

12%

Graph 6. Implementation and characteristics of the citizen participation mechanisms (2008)

Existence of mechanisms of citizen participation

21% 16%

58%

5%

There are notThere is a stable general body: participation forumThere are complementary participation bodies according to the different thematic fieldsThere are complementary participation bodies according to the different sectors

Validating the results of the processes of evaluation and programming

Making, discussing and agreeing proposals for the Local Action Plan

Informative

Collecting complaints and requests

There are no meetings

There has not been a meeting for more than 2 years

Specific meetings of the stable body (1 or 2 in the last two years)

Periodic meetings of the stable body (>2 a year)

5 OUTCOME AND CHALLENGES Based on the information analysed and interpreted, the

Report on Local Sustainability of the BAC 2008 extracts

some global conclusions and provides a set of challenges

for this year 2009, which are summarized next:

CHALLENGES 2009

Focusing on the continuous improvement of the •quality and the increase of the commitment of its participants.Advancing in the integration of the • Annual Pro-gramme within the management of the Local Action Plans of the town councils.Consolidating and increasing the quality and •number of indicators calculated and boosting the tasks of interpretation, communication and application in the management of the results of the indicators obtained every year.

The application of the common model of management of the Local Action Plans of Udalsa-rea 21 consolidates and expands among the municipalities of the network.in 2008 it was already implemented in 71 munici-palities and regions, with the participation of more than 800 agents, whereas in 2009 it will involve 90 municipalities and more than 1.100 agents. all this contributes to the increase of the involvement of the municipal technical staff and its methodo-logical knowledge, and to the improvement of the quality and efficiency in the assessment of laps and the calculation of indicators. nevertheless, the need to advance in the scope and quality of the indicators calculated by the municipalities in order to favour their effective application at a technical, political and social level is confirmed.

1

17 | OUTCOME AND CHALLENGES

2

in general terms, citizen participation is still one of the pending tasks in the implementation of the processes of local agenda 21. in spite of having an important group of stable participation bodies, they use to lack a periodical frequency of meetings and an appropriate operation dynamics. however, there are remarkable participative processes and others with plans for reactivation.

CHALLENGES 2009

Promoting the citizen communication about •the tracking of the LA21 and the indicators,

boosting the preparation of Reports on local

sustainability in municipalities.

Assessing the main barriers for the deployment •of the participative processes for the whole

network and creating improvement proposals.

Municipalities face important difficulties and barriers to conso-lidate and dynamize their processes of citizen participation.

3

the existence of an important mobilisation of the technical agents through laps is confirmed, with a 70% of their actions where technical or political staff not being coordinator of the local agenda 21 takes part. in turn, the assessment means a drive mechanism to the action which reaches 1,100 tech-nical and political agents from the local Basque administration. they have their management yearly reflected, assessed and acknowledge, both politi-cally and socially. nevertheless, the efforts done must be better valued, both in the field of manage-ment and in the field of communication, to keep the interest of these two agents in the processes of assessment in the future.

CHALLENGES 2009

Dynamizing the • commissions of municipal

sustainability.

Boosting the • practical application of the as-

sessment of Local Action Plans to improve the

planning and performance of LAPs.

The annual implementation and assessment of the Local Action Plans favours the involvement of technical staff in the policies of sustainability and the transversality in town councils.

18 | OUTCOME AND CHALLENGES

4

there is an increasing differentiation in the rhythms of performance between municipalities. in this sense, laps started the last three years stand out with a rhythm of implementation which doubles the one of laps started in earlier years, that in some cases are blocked. the main reasons can be: the increase and improvement of the support services provided from udalsarea 21, the higher number of help lines for the implementation of the Basque government and provincial councils, the implementation of the tracking programs, the improvement in the design of laps more adapted to the municipal reality and the higher allocation of human resources.

CHALLENGES 2009

To strengthen • political leadership in processes

by providing acknowledgement and public

visibility to those municipalities doing higher

efforts.

To deploy the • revision of Local Action Plans

with more validity years according to a com-

mon methodology.

To consolidate • services adapted to each type of

municipalities of Udalsarea 21 and the econo-

mic support to the implementation of LAPs.

The degree of implementation of the Local Action Plans is reasonably positive, reaching a 30% in two years and a half of validity.

5

the implementation of local action plans favours the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from the municipalities by means of the more than 2.300 actions contained related to energy, mobility, was-te and consumption. nevertheless, the number of specific actions to articulate and boost the fight against the climate change must be increased.

CHALLENGES 2009

Boosting• and visualizing the contribution to

the fight against climate change from the Local

Agenda 21 and incorporating climate change in

the revisions of Local Action Plans.

Promoting the calculation of the • inventory of

Greenhouse gas emissions.

Implementing the • Municipal Ordinance of fight

against climate change.

Local Agenda 21 substantially and increasingly contribute to f i ght against climate change.

19 |

UDALSAREA 21: DEPLOYMENT OF INSTRUMENTS FOR ACTION

Udalsarea 21 puts at disposal of member municipalities a

series of services directed to make it easier to advance in

terms of local sustainability. Services offered are adapted

and segmented according to the heterogeneity of mem-

bers and the conclusions of the Reports on Local Sustai-

nability of the BAC.

Nowadays, Udalsarea 21 offers about thirty services, de-

fined according to the operational goals collected in the

Strategic Plan 2006-2009 and its deployment in specific

actions. Services have different natures: informative,

formative, methodological, computer, assessment and

technical support and acknowledgement.

The network differentiates its service offer depending on

the level of implementation of the Local Agenda 21 of the

target municipality. This way, each one can satisfy the

specific needs of each level and, in turn, its efforts and the

quality obtained in the process will be acknowledged.

6


20 |

+ CO

MM

ITM

ENT

+

ACK

NO

WLE

DGEM

ENT

METHODOLOGICAL GUIDES GOOD PRACTICESTRAINING ON

SUSTAINABILITY

www.udalsarea21.net

UDALSAREA21AWARDS

ECONOMIC CONTRIBUTIONS

ASSESSMENT AND TRACKING OF LOCAL ACTION PLANS

ECOBAROMETERS

MUGI 21

ADVANCED SERVICES

BASIC SERVICES

INTERMEDIATE SERVICES

Figure 3: Services offered by Udalsarea 21 for member municipalities


21 |

The most emblematic services offered and the level of development reached for year 2008 appears below.

(1)Municipal ecobarometers: survey on the environmental perception of the citizenship whose information is used to calculate local sustainability indicators.

(2)Ekitaldes: thematic work groups of municipalities directed to learning through action and generating common resources for the network.

(3)Auzolan 21: technical and economic support service for the execution of pilot and innovative projects articulated through teamwork of a limited number of municipalities with a high commitment of action.

(4)Berringurumena: Development of innovative projects in priority fields set in the efp ii and which substantially contribute to reduce environmental impacts (in 2008 projects linked to climate change, Quality of air and Biodiversity).

Network’s services Activity indicator Value 2008

BASIC SERVICESihobe-line telephone information service no. of queries 263

training on sustainabilityno. training days 4no. people attending training activities 200

methodological guides no. publications 6good practices no. of good practices identified 60Web www.udalsarea21.net no. visits 144,000INTERMEDIATE SERVICES

computer application mugi 21 no. municipalities and regions users 150municipal ecobarometers(1) no. municipalities with ecobarometer 24

ekitaldes (thematic work teams) (2)no. active ekitaldes 6no. municipalities taking part in ekitaldes 134

assessment and tracking of local action plans

no. municipalities with assessed local action plan 71no. municipalities with calculated sustainability indicators 58

ADVANCED SERVICES

udalsarea21 awards no. of awards conceded to municipalities 5

assistance from the Basque government and provincial councils

total amount granted in contributions of support for the implementation of local action plans (€) 17,750,000 €

auzolan 21(3)no. common auzolan 21 projects 2no. municipalities taking part in auzolan 21 projects 13

Berringurumena(4)no. projects 4allocated budget (€) 500,000 €

www.udalsarea21.net


v

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

REPORT ON LOCAL SUSTAINABILITY OF THE BASQUE AUTONOMOUS COMMUNITY 2008

Documents

Report on local sustainability of the Basque Autonomous Community 2008